


pack up the moon and dismantle the sun

by dovahfiin



Series: the stars are not wanted now [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Emotional Baggage, Emotional Manipulation, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Infidelity, Introspection, Physical Abuse, Regret
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-04
Updated: 2017-06-05
Packaged: 2018-10-28 01:44:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 3,325
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10821132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dovahfiin/pseuds/dovahfiin
Summary: They weren't the heroes the galaxy chooses to remember, nor were the reasons for bloodshed as cut and dry.





	1. Hic sum Palpatine

**Author's Note:**

> I've chosen a handful of characters, both major and minor, to explore at some length.
> 
> Wookiee honor code, intergalactic drug abuse, and anything overtly not in Wookieepedia are a few things with which I've taken liberties.
> 
> I do not own Star Wars. Sue me, do not.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vanity begets malevolence.

The Emperor was depicted in the holovids as an aged albeit distinguished figure - a man whose oratory and mien were kindly and intelligent, much like Chancellor Palpatine had been during the Clone Wars. The citizens of an ever-changing galaxy had come to depend on such menial representations; and, for all his disfigurements, he maintained no small amount of vanity. Palpatine had always been drawn to aesthetic - sharp lines, the hardened and resolute features borne of purpose and ambition. Appearance was what had brought him to the Dark Side.

Darth Vader couldn't be hidden with such illusions, however, and whenever Palpatine chose to break through his not-inconsiderable walls to peruse the thoughts of his apprentice (anymore a macabre, twisted, painful library of memories) he found that Vader was not interested in keeping up appearances. Then again, what good would it do for a man encased in onyx armor? Vader was the enforcer of the Empire, not its face.

He had once been able to touch Anakin's face. The act had calmed them both, waves of something akin to Light reverberating off each other and strengthening them in their turn. It was a feeling not even Padme had been able to coax from Vader - _Anakin_ \- and the fact that Palpatine could do something the Senator-Queen could not was a heady high unlike that of any spice Palpatine had yet tasted. Now, he was relegated to light touches on the arms of Vader's syntheleather; the only places he could still feel faint pulses of the Force, the only places he could still make out the radiant warmth of living flesh.

Vader didn't know it, but his master was just as insistent when it came to Obi Wan Kenobi's death. He acted as if Kenobi's life were some inconsequential thing, some housefly whose demise would delight but who ultimately meant nothing. Many Jedi had escaped the purge, and throughout his tenure Darth Vader had expertly and methodically wiped them out; but he had left Kenobi, and Tatooine, untouched.

Kenobi had taken Anakin's body, had quashed his resolve and unknowingly competed for (and won) his affections. And that had been the worst infraction of them all.

Darth Plagueis had loved his apprentice. Darth Tenebrous had loved Plagueis. That was the greatest, most unfathomable secret of the Sith; they _did_ love, contrary to the emotionally constipated tenets of the Jedi, and perhaps that is crack in which the Light pours through. Palpatine wasn't fool enough to think that the Dark Side had no room for love; it was for love that Vader destroyed worlds and brought them to their knees for the Empire. It was for love that he came (mostly) unbidden to the Dark Side, and it would be for love that he would someday deny it. Palpatine, even in his great power, could do nothing to stop the tide of the Force. Its ultimate design was unknowable, yet he would always search. He would always reach.

And so his physical appearance, while occasionally troublesome, was a price he was willing to pay for even a taste of what the Dark Side of the Force could conjure. He imagined that Vader, if pressed, would admit the same.

He often wondered what his father, the venerable Cosinga Palpatine, would think of his son now. The man who beat him, belittled him, pushed him to the brink of his cracked sanity before pulling him back with affection and gifts and long, rambling walks through the orchard adjacent to their sprawling home in the lake country. The man whose snow white hair he envied, whose ability to quiet a room with his measured steps a testament to his noble blood. He would tell Sheev that he was as brilliant as he was useless; that he would amount to nothing in the end. That the Darkness within him would overtake his humanity and he would never achieve the greatness his father had set for him. Vader, for his size and imposing presence, was the embodiment of all the nightmares a young Sheev had conjured about his father - the truth of him, the wholeness of him. The fear that gripped him, separating his family from the Force, dark and syrupy, that tainted his veins. House Palpatine was noble, and the injection of the Dark Side into the male heir heralded nothing but scandal and trouble. Too many servants mysteriously dead, always clumsily dragged along with an untrained Force talent to a shaded spot underneath Sheev's favorite apple tree. Always discovered by Cosinga, and always rewarded with a beating.

When Hego came to him, tall and lithe and elegant in his rage, Sheev didn't hesitate. The body of his domineering, traditionalist father lie dead at his feet. His mother's blood bathed him, the look in her eyes when he squeezed the life out of her fed a deep, wanting need. Out of habit, he had left their bodies beneath the apple tree, mangled and nearly unrecognizable. His new master had been pleased with the demented sentiment.

And now his aspirations had birthed an Empire, with the fist of Vader to quell its undulating terror. If the Dark Side contorted his body, let its power be his lips; let its terror be his eyes, and his ears the thunderous march of Stormtroopers. In this, at least, he could remain beautiful.


	2. Life Debt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chewbacca toils over the emotional complexities of his debt-holder.

He rolls out of bed, head already pounding with the beginning of a ripping hangover. The phosphorous, insistent lights of Nar Shaddaa gleamed through the blackout curtains, bringing his headache to a deafening crescendo. Chewie snored wistfully on the couch opposite the bed where the wookiee had placed his inebriated charge five standard hours before. He watched his companion now, shielded as he was by the darkness of the room - for which Chewbacca had paid with his own credits, just like the Corellian ale whose wrath Han was currently battling.

He whimpered out a protestation, garnering a non-committal grunt from the smuggler. "We'll go to Hoth when I'm damned good and ready. Fuck their orders."

_"You're not a smuggler anymore. You're part of something bigger than you realize."_

"Only to pile credits into my account to get Jabba off my back, yeah. That's pretty big."

_"And you have no feelings for Leia? Or Luke, for that matter? You're very protective of him for one who has a singular agenda."_

"Kriff you."

Chewbacca fell silent. He knew that arguing with Han was a fool's errand, especially if he had his mind made up. They were two standard days late to report to the Alliance outpost on Hoth, but after the destruction of the Death Star, the shaken smuggler had needed the time to decompress. Loathe as he was to admit it, Chewie understood; his charge was in shock, and he needed somewhere to put it. He just preferred to put it in the bottom of a bottle.

He had watched Han steadily unravel since meeting Leia Organa. Human courtship, Chewbacca had quickly learned, was completely dissimilar to the straightforward practices of his people. The princess' pheromones changed in potency whenever Han was around, and for his part the musk emanating from him was unmistakable. They were interested in each other beyond copulation, but it was not his job to interfere. At least, it wasn't until Han had turned again to an old habit in a vain attempt to quash these feelings. Such coping mechanisms were considered dishonorable among wookiees, and so Chewbacca held his debt-holder to the same standards. He would let him have one more of these benders before insisting that he take better care of himself; the Rebellion needed him. Leia and Luke needed him.

_"We will garner unwanted attention here. This is still a planet under heavy Imperial regulation"._

Han was pouring an impressive amount of caf into a stone mug, swirling bantha milk into the potent liquid. "Yeah, buddy. Just as soon as I finish my morning cup. You know the routine."

Chewbacca rose from his cot, grabbing the carbine baldric and placing it over his shoulder. He secured the large crossbow to his back and, thus attired, patiently waited through Han's morning routine. Once the mug of caf had been drained and refilled twice, the smuggler walked naked to the 'fresher (Chewbacca noticed he was even thinner - he would have to ensure that Han's strength returned at some point, although the skeletal appearance was not entirely Han's fault) and stood under water as hot as he could stand for forty minutes. He emerged haloed with steam, walking across the expanse of the modest suite, collecting his clothes as he went. Clothes that Chewbacca had used rudimentary skill to somewhat launder before throwing them back on the floor where Han had carelessly tossed them the night before. Han didn't bother to hide his nakedness anymore. His shame had gone to the same place as had his pride.

He dressed carefully, still sore from the rigors of combat and space travel. Chewbacca averted his gaze, noticing Han tossing a white oval pill into his mouth and letting it dissolve on his tongue before chasing it with a gulp of cold caf. Synthdeine was a highly addictive painkiller which Han had reportedly abused throughout his short tenure as a young officer of the Empire, but Chewbacca hadn't seen him use it in years. At least, not until the explosion of the Death Star and his subsequent slide into something akin to madness. He shot Han a reproachful look.

"You'd have vices, too."

_"War is its own vice."_

"We're gonna start the day off like this, huh? With judgment and scolding?"

Chewbacca shook his head emphatically. _"No. I don't want to argue with a nerfherder today. Today, I want to fly to Hoth. I miss our companions."_

Han pulled his polished boots over fresh black socks, jumping up to his feet (he wobbled with the premature enthusiasm in the movement) and secured his blaster in its holster around his thigh, letting the belt drop to the thickest point of his pitifully narrow hips. "Yeah. Y'know, you're getting too attached. Hells, maybe it'd be good to --" Han abruptly shook his head as if he could will the thoughts away. Chewbacca groaned.

_"You shouldn't have to keep running from how you feel like this. They're not going to abandon you. Not like --"_

"Don't say it." Han's finger pointed toward his companion in accusation, but his bloodshot eyes were clouded with grief. "Don't fucking say it."

_"Let them in, Han. Your bones grow brittle. Your demons will always chase you, but perhaps you can find solace in new friendships."_

Han put on his black jacket in a huff, tossing his old cargo vest at his companion, along with an offensive gesture. "Don't get soft. We've still got a job to do."

Chewbacca fell into step behind Han Solo wordlessly, grateful for a temporary ceasefire. Han was in love with Leia; he would see that soon. He would learn to audit what his heart and his mind needed, and he would learn to let go -- eventually.


	3. Terrible Liar

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He didn't necessarily mean Galen was a terrible liar. They all were, in their turn.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is ridiculously AU; some of these installments will be as the muse moves. Sorry 'bout it.

He hateloved Galen. He admireloathed him. Wanted to spit in his eyes and roll his tongue against his teeth, wanted to erect monuments to his brilliance and tear them down with his bare hands.

The kriffing bastard wanted a transfer to _Eadu_ , of all the miserable places, and Krennic was hard pressed to find a reason not to grant it. Letting his personal feelings cloud his judgment could bring undue attention from undesirable sources (mostly Tarkin, who was always searching for a reason to lambaste him in front of their peers) and discredit his hard-won position besides. At any rate, he had the ultimate sway over Erso - he had _Jyn_. Had her twice just that afternoon.

Krennic was on leave, relaxing against the insistent waves crashing against the rocky crags beneath his villa on the coast of Coruscant, far from the prying eyes of the city. Jyn had graduated from the Royal Imperial Academy on world and, due in large part to the limitless bureaucratic sway held by her paramour, won a post in a weapons division outfit in the heart of the Imperial Center. She was within reach at all times, as was her father. The situation could not have been more ideal.

So he would come home on leave for a few days here and there, and she would be granted concurrent leave (and anyone who looked sideways at the flimsiplast containing her expedited requests managed to disappear and end up with their necks bent at odd angles on the lower levels of the city proper) and they would pretend, for such a blissfully short time, that he was not a Director and she was not a glorified hostage.

She loved him. She had to for her own survival, but she also loved him of her own volition - which was just as dangerous. _He_ was dangerous. And her father would have been furious had he known the truth.

But Krennic was kind when the white cape was off, when the crisp tunic and shining pips were hung up and he was standing in a sprawling marble kitchen scrambling eggs and winking at her over the rim of a cup of caf. He was not the menacing, fit-throwing narcissist - but he still lamented Tarkin's didactic standards of behavior, a habit Jyn chalked up to some slumbering lust (though in what way she wasn't certain and didn't care to know) manifesting itself in listless complaint. Krennic wasn't a good man, but could any man in the galaxy truly claim to be good anymore?

In the evenings he would read, old tomes with musty pages written in a language Jyn didn't recognize. He would look out over the veranda, out beyond the rocky shores, out, out beyond the farthest stretches of Coruscant. He would refuse her salt-tinged kisses, instead offering her his hand and she would silently hold it, massaging the thick, soft pad of his thumb with her palm while she pretended not to notice the misty glaze that clouded his vision as the suns set.

And the next morning he would pull on his jodhpurs and stare at her apologetically, the soft lines in his face hardening as he secured his rank bar to his chest; as he fitted the black belt around his waist, over the painfully starched high-collar uniform tunic. The transformation into a man she hated was complete once the cape fell around his shoulders, the soft lines become crags not at all unlike the jutting basalt below their villa.

He would leave, and she would leave, and they would forget how they could have easily left it all behind for some backwater Outer Rim planet where Orson would tinker and Jyn would fish, and maybe they could forget plans and vendettas and rank.


	4. Queen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She had known all along.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, lookee here - another AUish chapter.

"We can alter the path we take along the way, but sooner or later the galaxy will demand its recompense. I cannot change this. I cannot interfere."

"So you're a tool of the Dark Side? You don't maintain your own free will?"

"Not entirely, but my ultimate design has always been to harness the power of the Chosen One, to wield it as a means of exacting peace. Look around you, Senator. Do you truly believe that democracy begets peace?"

"I believe in the power of a collective group with a common goal to make productive change, yes. I am not a Force-wielder. I can't see beyond the fibers of physical reality the way you can. I'm not sure that I trust your designs, but I'm powerless to stop them."

"And Anakin?"

"I am just as powerless to stop him. He's volatile, impulsive; I can't will the broken parts of him back together, and I can't bring a child into this."

"Regardless, we stand on a precipice as a galactic community - the ledge of which extends to depths not even I can foresee. But I do know that there will be resistance; there will be blood. It would behoove you to go into hiding; raise your children, keep them away from Anakin and what he is to become. They could possess the same profound connection to the Force as he, which means that --"

"They could fall as he will."

"Precisely."

A brief silence settles between them. Grief, confusion, and sadness fight to win the dominant emotion within her. She settles on grief.

"When did you..."

"Become Sith? I was a young man, not yet even a page. My entire career has been built around the eventual rise to Supreme Chancellor. My master's foresight was always more practiced, better honed; he saw a need to protect the galaxy by offering it a lesser terror."

"And where is your master now?"

"Dead by my hand. It is the way of the Sith; the Rule of Two."

"I am vaguely familiar."

He laughs, a mirthless silken baritone. There was no humor in it. "You can take heart in one thing: Anakin will eventually succeed me. I will die by his hand, and you will inherit an Empire in which your children may even survive."

Her mind works despite the racing thoughts streaking through her consciousness, unable to pin any of them down but suddenly arriving at a conclusion that flushed her cheeks and made her blood run cold all at once.

"What must I do?"

His grin bears teeth; it borders on the maniacal.

"Have you ever heard the tragedy of Darth Plagueis the Wise?"


	5. your hands once touched this table and this silver

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The former Chancellor remembers the golden age of the Jedi and the short-lived health of the Republic.

They will tell you that I was escorted from the Senate chamber and whisked away, my heart heavy laden so that I could not speak. They will tell you that I was shocked, betrayed, and hurt by the vote of no confidence; that I was considered weak and ineffectual, an archetype of an age no longer pertinent.

They would be right.

I fled to Naboo in shame, seeking the solitude of the lake country and the refuge of a small two-room bothy sandwiched in between its verdant hills. I took a lover half my age. Tangled in the shimmersilk sheets and his pale limbs, I watched the HoloNet portent galactic implosion on a daily basis.

When Darth Vader rose from the ashes as Palpatine's champion, I knew. When my former queen and fellow senator Amidala perished during the birth of the devil's children, I wept against the hard muscle of my lover's chest.

I watched this happen from a place where no one could find me to ask questions. How could I have allowed this to happen, how could my dereliction of duty been so profound? I toiled over those answers in the darkness and the lines of my face deepened ever more. There are no answers.

The Jedi had once been deities. Their emotional celibacy was not proud as it would be later; they strode through their marbled halls with humility and light pulsing from their countenance. I was constantly in awe. They sustained themselves on justice and prudence; on wisdom and foresight. They were beautiful and luminous; deadly in their course but they always sought to coax the galaxy forward in peace. Blood was spilled only in true need.

The Order never completely recovered from Master Jinn's death, I believe. Kenobi was a floundering, arrogant boy even as he ascended to Knighthood and didn't bother masking his pretentious proclivities even after becoming a Master. The truth is that he was jealous, and that poison spread throughout that once-proud temple like ink spilled on a porous parchment. It affected and infected everyone around them; giving them military responsibilities and titles only stretched them further out of their once-regal positions.

By the time I was voted out, I had heard of no less than three plots within the Jedi Temple which involved one Knight attempting to subvert another - even unto death.

Anakin had not been wrong.

And now, as the galaxy waits for its death on its knees, I am loathe to whisper: "I knew."


End file.
